A train rushing through the Yorkshire landscape -- as I once rushed to Jim, September 1969 (very first still of Downton Abbey, the 1st season).

Those who are left are different people trying to lead the same lives … (Graham Warleggan, Bk 1, Chs 4 , pp. 55)

Dear friends and readers,

Clive James was a favorite poet for Jim. I own four books of James's poetry, couplet satiric art about London and the literary world, which Jim would read aloud from to me. I didn't understand most of the references, and probably couldn't enter into the spirit of these as I didn't know enough about the people. They are Pope updated. I could and did read James's journalistic criticism.

It became apparent to me sometime last year that James is dying: he has a fatal illness and is living with a daughter and grandchildren: I noticed first one great poem, and then another, saw a brief explanation and now fit together here the four thus far.

1.

Sentenced to Life

Sentenced to life, I sleep face-up as thoughIce-bound, lest I should cough the night away,And when I walk the mile to town, I showThe right technique for wading through deep clay.A sad man, sorrier than he can say.

But surely not so guilty he should dieEach day from knowing that his race is run:My sin was to be faithless. I would lieAs ifI could be true to everyoneAt once, and all the damage that was done

Was in the name of love, or so I thought.I might have met my death believing this,But no, there was a lesson to be taught.Now, not just old, but ill, with much amiss,I see things with a whole new emphasis.

My daughter’s garden has a goldfish poolWith six fish, each a little finger long.I stand and watch them following their ruleOf never touching, never going wrong:Trajectories as perfect as plain song.

Once, I would not have noticed; nor have knownThe name for Japanese anemones,So pale, so frail. But now I catch the toneOf leaves. No birds can touch down in the treesWithout my seeing them. I count the bees.

Even my memories are clearly seen:Whence comes the answer if I’m told I mustBe aching for my homeland. Had I beenDulled in the brain to match my lungs of dustThere’d be no recollection I could trust.

Yet I, despite my guilt, despite my grief,Watch the Pacific sunset, heaven sent,In glowing colours and in sharp relief,Painting the white clouds when the day is spent,As if it were my will and testament –

As if my first impressions were my last,And time had only made them more defined,Now I am weak. The sky is overcastHere in the English autumn, but my mindBasks in the light I never left behind.

2.

Rounded with a Sleep

The sun seems in control, the tide is out:Out to the sandbar shimmers the lagoon.The little children sprint, squat, squeal and shout.These shallows will be here until the moonContrives to reassert its influence,And anyway, by then it will be dark.Old now and sick, I ponder the immenseOcean upon which I will soon embark:As if held in abeyance by dry landIt waits for me beyond that strip of sand.

It won’t wait long. Just for the moment, though,There’s time to question if my present stateOf bathing in this flawless afterglowIs something I deserve. I left it lateTo come back to my family. Here they are,Camped on their towels and putting down their booksTo watch my grand-daughter, a natural star,Cartwheel and belly-flop. The whole scene looksAs if I thought it up to soothe my soul.But in Arcadia, Death plays a role:

A leading role, and suddenly I wakeTo realise that I’ve been sound asleepHere at my desk. I just wish the mistakeWere rare, and not so frequent I could weep.The setting alters, but the show’s the same:One long finale, soaked through with regret,Somehow designed to expiate self-blame.But still there is no end, at least not yet:No cure, that is, for these last years of griefAs I repent and yet find no relief.

My legs are sore, and it has gone midnight.I’ve had my last of lounging on the beachTo see the sweet oncoming sunset lightTouching the water with a blush of peach,Smoothing the surface like a ballroom floorAs all my loved ones pack up from their dayAnd head back up the cliff path. This for sure:Even the memories will be washed away,If not by waves, by rain, which I see fall,Drenching the flagstones and the garden wall.

My double doors are largely glass. I standOften to contemplate the neat back yardMy elder daughter with her artist’s handDesigned for me. This winter was less hardThan its three predecessors were. The snowFailed to arrive this time, but rain, for me,Will also do to register time’s flow.The rain, the snow, the inexorable sea:I get the point. I’ll climb the stairs to bed,Perhaps to dream I’m somewhere else instead.

All day tomorrow I have tests and scans,And everything that happens will be real.My blood might say I should make no more plans,And when it does so, that will be the deal.But until then I love to speak with youEach day we meet. Sometimes we even touchAcross the sad gulf that I brought us to.Just for a time, so little means so much:More than I’m worth, I know, as I know howMy death is something I must live with now.

My beloved Clarycat who so loved Jim, grieved for him, and whom I now spend my days and my nights too with; she and Ian, her brother are attached to me (and Izzy) and we to them (Spring 2014)

3.

Japanese Maple

Your death, near now, is of an easy sort.

So slow a fading out brings no real pain.Breath growing shortIs just uncomfortable. You feel the drainOf energy, but thought and sight remain:

Enhanced, in fact. When did you ever seeSo much sweet beauty as when fine rain fallsOn that small treeAnd saturates your brick back garden walls,So many Amber Rooms and mirror halls?

Ever more lavish as the dusk descendsThis glistening illuminates the air.It never ends.Whenever the rain comes it will be there,Beyond my time, but now I take my share.

My daughter’s choice, the maple tree is new.Come autumn and its leaves will turn to flame.What I must doIs live to see that. That will end the gameFor me, though life continues all the same:

Filling the double doors to bathe my eyes,A final flood of colors will live onAs my mind dies,Burned by my vision of a world that shoneSo brightly at the last, and then was gone.

Northwest by Susan Stokes, 21st century

4.

The Star System

The stars in their magnificent arrayLook down upon the Earth, their cynosure,Or so it seems. They are too far away,In fact, to see a thing; hence they look pureTo us. They lack the textures of our globe,So only we, from cameras carried high,Enjoy the beauty of the swirling robeThat wraps us up, the interplay of skyAnd cloud, as if a Wedgwood plate of blueAnd white should melt, and then, its surface stirredWith spoons, a treasure too good to be true,Be placed, and hover like a hummingbird,Drawing all eyes, though ours alone, to feastOn splendor as it turns west from the East.

There was a time when some of our young menWalked plumply on the moon and saw Earth rise,As stunning as the sun. The years since thenHave aged them. Now and then somebody dies.It’s like a clock, for those of us who sawThe Saturn rockets going up as ifMankind had energy to burn. The lawIs different for one man. Time is a cliffYou come to in the dark. Though you might fallAs easily as on a feather bed,It is a sad farewell. You loved it all.You dream that you might keep it in your head.But memories, where can you take them to?Take one last look at them. They end with you.

And still the Earth revolves, and still the blazeOf stars maintains a show of vigilance.It should, for long ago, in olden days,We came from there. By luck, by fate, by chance,All of the elements that form the worldWere sent by cataclysms deep in space,And from their combination life unfurledAnd stood up straight, and wore a human face.I still can’t pass a mirror. Like a boy,I check my looks, and now I see the shellOf what I was. So why, then, this strange joy?Perhaps an old man dying would do wellTo smile as he rejoins the cosmic dustLife comes from, for resign himself he must.

... Larkin’s poem “Aubade”, with its terror of extinction (“Not to be here, / Not to be anywhere, / And soon”). Larkin’s lines in turn owe something to Shakespeare (“Ay, but to die and go we know not where”), but they’re still the ultimate measure. If James falls short, there’s no shame in that, since every other poet does so, too. To his credit, he implicitly acknowledges the debt to “Aubade” and its plangent, atheistic despair. Just as Larkin laments death’s elimination of sensory experience (“no sight, no sound, / No touch or taste or smell”), James speaks of “our lives laid bare, / And then no sound, no sight, no thought. Nowhere”.